SUED FOR PEACE (The Kurtherian Gambit Book 11)

by Michael Anderle

  Marcus raised his can of beer and held it out to the other two. Bobcat leaned in and William sat down and placed his in the middle as well. Marcus spoke, “To All Guns Blazing, may we not go down in flames on our first night!”

  The three chuckled as they touched their cans of beer together.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  PLA Offices, CHINA

  General Sun Zedong stood up from his desk and grabbed his clipboard. He walked out of his office and past the large meeting table with his favorite word in brass on the top to remind everyone what the focus of China long term was in every meeting.

  And his personal goal, Power.

  He walked through the door to the other side to meet with those on the ruling council and deliver the update in a secret meeting and receive his direction. So far, all attacks had been successful. A request for another surgical strike inside of the United States was on his clipboard for inclusion.

  They did not need to have a reporting team running around and messing up their longer term preparatory power efforts. While this request was outside of his direct focus, he had the resources inside the U.S. right now. He had two teams in place and one target. He might as well make it a double hit as long as the ruling members overseeing his effort agreed.

  He checked out of the building and sat in the back seat of the car taking him to his meeting.

  It was a good day, he considered, as the flags flew in the breeze over the PLA offices.

  Washington D.C., USA

  The inside of the cargo van was dark save the few red lights and screens Team Leader Hu’s team used to keep track of what was outside of their vehicle.

  Hu looked down at the comment added to an eBay product. “The operation is a go,” he said. The four men finished with the application of makeup to darken their skin and place the colored contacts. Should anyone see them in the darkness this evening, they should not be able to pick any out of a line-up, nor would they even understand they were Chinese in the first place.

  It wasn’t often a request to take out American nationals was provided their team, but they were part of an elite group, and questions didn’t come up about the targets they were given.

  By now, he and his team knew the three people very well. They had been tracking them for two and a half weeks. Two men, one lady. The men were obviously protection of some type. They seemed remarkably young and his team had never seen them with any weapons on their persons. Twice they had passed by the three in groups of two and three, to see their reactions.

  Minimal.

  Their main target was the takedown of the lady. She was causing issues as the conduit for communications between TQB and those in DC that their country needed to persuade. Too often, a diplomat would arrive and potentially get a sympathetic ear only to have this team show up soon after and change their mind.

  Now, it was time to take out the problem.

  Hu checked his men’s equipment and clothes. They all wore different types of suits. All had knives secreted about their bodies and pistols.

  He doubted they would need to do anything with the pistols. The two men were going to have the focus of his three men, and he would focus on the girl.

  He watched one of the monitors and found his targets coming down Ridge Street and signaled his team. The van would follow on an adjacent street. Their exit strategy was down an alley, into the van and disappear into the night.

  They shut off their electronics, and he cracked the door.

  It was time to go.

  —

  Scottie was walking far behind the group ahead of him. His job was typically to trail Matthew, Rickie, and Jennifer whenever they were moving from place to place. He liked his job, and he liked this group. Getting to know Matthew and Rickie was a pleasure. Both were one of the first Werewolves that had joined the Queen’s group, and they were a good group. Rickie was constantly joking around, and he had even been able to get the normally quiet and easygoing Matthew to crack a smile and joke around. Jennifer had become more and more accustomed to her little group.

  Which was good, because there was no way she was going to be let off the leash without them.

  She even had a date one time, with them along sitting at the next table over. She threw a little tantrum at that time until she spoke to Jakob, her boss. He told her in no uncertain terms what could happen and might happen to her if she went anywhere without them.

  Then Colorado happened, and she used her guys as a security blanket at night for two weeks.

  Scottie was watching two blocks ahead of the three when he noticed four men coming around a corner. They looked just fine, but something about their walk, their spacing… something. Something seemed to at least suggest caution to the ex-marine. He coughed twice and then mentioned ‘four ahead’ in the middle of the coughing fit.

  No humans would understand a word he said. For the two Queen’s Guardians, it was child's play. He noticed Matthew give him a quick sign by scratching over his shoulder. Two seconds later, Jennifer stopped walking and stepped a little closer to the street, Matthew and Rickie took up positions to protect her.

  Scottie kept walking towards them, placing a hand inside his pocket.

  He had to depend that his instincts were right.

  Scottie smiled as he saw Rickie start pantomiming a female with a broken shoe as he hopped in a quick circle in place. Rickie arrived back at his starting point with at least fifteen feet to spare before the group arrived, coming from the other direction.

  Scottie continued looking past everyone, but could see that one of the men spoke to the group, and one guy in the front looked in his direction and gave a small nod of his head.

  “It’s going down, boys,” Scottie mentioned as he gripped the butt of his pistol.

  Damned, even while paying attention to his own mark, Scottie was impressed with the speed and precision of the three men left. They were all walking a few paces away from each other by the time they arrived near Matthew and Scottie and turned in perfect unison. All were swiping deadly fast, with knives he assumed.

  If their targets had been human, they would be dead. Fucking shame they weren’t human, Scottie thought as he pulled his pistol and shot the man heading at him.

  —

  Hu noticed the one man walking quickly towards their group. Damn, he was going to have to kill an innocent. Not a good night to be out walking, but worse things could happen, Hu figured.

  He spoke softly in Mandarin, “Gen, take out the man walking this way. Make it as painless as possible, the fates were not with him tonight.”

  Gen nodded his head and started walking faster than the group. His remaining two men changed their paces. Guowei stepped ahead a couple of steps, Lok slowed a couple of steps behind him. It would allow all three the ability to pivot and come at the group from three directions. The two males would go down quickly, the girl would be next.

  He noticed the group had stopped, and the girl was bitching about a shoe. Then, one of her guards started hopping around and making fun of her.

  Hu’s lips pressed together, that was so very unprofessional.

  —

  Matthew heard the coughing and cocked an ear backward. Matthew spoke to Rickie, “Hey, eats-a-lot, we have four ahead.” He turned towards Jennifer, “Jenni, I need you to act like you have a problem with your shoe, then get closer to the street. We have inbound.”

  Jennifer suddenly yelped and stumbled. Then she stopped and started hopping a little as she tried to grab her high heel shoe. “Dammit! These little fuckers make my ass look tight but they’re such a pain in the butt to wear.” She hopped a couple of steps closer to the street, next to a car and put one hand on it as she slid a finger behind the shoe and took it off. Then, she took the other off in case she needed to run.

  Rickie was smiling then started squeaking in a high voice as he hopped on his left foot and turned in a counter-clockwise circle, “Look! I’ve got a rock in my shoe, but my ass is TIGHT!” He grinned the whole time, then barely
whispered to Matthew, “No one else in the vicinity, just these four.”

  Matthew said as he looked away from the four for a second so they would not see his mouth, “Got it.”

  —

  Hu was in the middle of the group as he spoke right as he was in between the two guards, “Xiànzài!” His men performed to perfection, the three of them swung to their left, knives hidden until the last second. Hu had decided to attack the Asian looking guard first and then provide Guowei with support with the unprofessional Hispanic guard.

  Lok would swing his right arm to come around, and if the guard was fast, he would be able to block Lok’s attack, but Hu’s would make it through. Hu would take one step forward, then turn clockwise to attack the second guard from his back, cutting through his neck.

  Lok was twisting fast, Hu doubted the guard would be able to block the attack. Hu was starting to move into his attack when he was shocked to understand not only had the Asian seen the attack coming, he had decided to twist slightly to the left.

  Hu barely had time to register shock when Lok’s knife, still held by Lok’s hand slammed into his chest. The Asian had grabbed Lok’s hand and forearm and propelled Lok further in the direction of his original turn. He had overpowered Lok and forced him to do exactly as he wanted.

  “You won’t need this,” the Asian told Hu as his right hand grabbed him and casually yanked Lok’s hand off of the knife, leaving it impaled in Hu’s chest, who was weakly reaching for it. Matthew twirled it a couple of times in his right hand before he let go of Lok’s arm and tossed the knife from his right hand to his left. One half-twirl to grab the knife by the hilt, but pointed away from his thumb.

  It was a time measured in a partial second when Hu’s knife was shoved into Lok’s eye socket. Matthew heard a pistol shot and turned towards Scottie.

  —

  Rickie was mentally considering the odds he would get two of the three guys and then noticed the slight turn of the man in the middle towards Matthew.

  Racists, always thinking the best fighters were Asian, Rickie thought. He said nothing because while he might want to smart off during a fight, Peter would have his nuts if he was anything less than professional. Sure enough, the clown attacked on some sort of yelled Chinese word and pivoted towards Rickie and was darting in with a knife.

  Rickie wanted to howl in excitement! Here he was going to get a little payback for all of the boredom he had been suffering. He opened his left hand and used it to shield the knife striking at him. The knife impaled his hand. The man was surprised just long enough for Rickie to pivot on his left leg and kick out at the man’s left kneecap that was anchoring his stance.

  His leg broke at an odd angle from Rickie’s kick. The man went down and was staring in shock as Rickie smiled at him and pulled the knife out of his hand and then licked some of his blood off, “You guys done gone and fucked up.” Rickie twirled the knife a second then his arm darted forward, throwing the knife into the man’s neck.

  That’s when he heard the shot, and he turned to see Scottie aiming at the fourth man who was going for a different weapon when Scottie put one between his eyes. Scottie walked past the downed man after checking him quickly and was looking around the street for additional targets.

  “We need to am-scray people,” Scottie told the three of them. “Call in a Pod Group if we can. There is a pickup car somewhere, and we want to be gone. There wasn’t any ID on my guy, check those three and let’s go.”

  Matthew was talking into his phone. Rickie reached out to pull Jennifer over to him and started walking away from the fight, “Don’t look, you don’t need this in your psyche right now Jenni.” She nodded to him, and he pulled her in tight before letting her go. He could hear Matthew checking the three bodies as Scottie continued behind them. About ten seconds later, Rickie could hear Matthew running to catch up.

  He joined the three of them since Scottie had moved up to within ten feet of the group, “I’ve called it in. There is a park four blocks ahead and two to the left. They will be there in ten minutes.”

  “Let’s just hope no one finds us before then,” Scottie said. “Find a dark place we can defend and hide. Let’s move.” Scottie started jogging and ran past the three of them. He called over his shoulder, “Matthew, you’re defense, Rickie, you’re transportation.” With that, he turned his head to look ahead of them.

  “Who’s transportation for who?” Jennifer started then spoke in a hiss, “Hey! I’m not a sack of potatoes here!”

  Rickie bent down, grabbed Jennifer and tossed her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. He turned towards Scottie and started running. “I’d say! A sack of potatoes is about ten pounds. What are you, one-twenty? That’s like, what, twelve sacks of potatoes or more?”

  She slapped his back, “Put me down you talking dog!” Then she caught on to what he said and slapped him again, “I’m not a pound over one-hundred five you bastard!”

  “Nope, parents were married before I came along,” Rickie answered as they all ran, “You might be able to question my oldest brother, there seems to be some fuzzy math about their married night and his birth night. But, they were married over three years before your’s truly came along.”

  They stayed in the shadows as much as possible and made it to the park in record time. Rickie swung Jennifer forward, caught her, and carried her in his arms, “Ready to get down Princess?”

  Jennifer looked up at Rickie and realized he wasn’t smiling his characteristic smirk but was watching out from under the trees they were hiding in. She started shaking and buried her head in his chest and shook her head no.

  Rickie held her tight. No one was getting to this girl without killing him first.

  Clan Temple Near Shennongjia Peak, Hubei

  Stephanie Lee watched as her hand turned into a clawed hand, fur developing through her skin. Power radiated out of her as she watched her naked body change in the mirror.

  She had been working on her physical changes for four days now. She had to rest after about six hours of effort.

  But, she was getting there.

  The first time she met her father after the change, it took all her will not to slap him. She treated him coldly and he responded with respect.

  The respect she had wanted, and now would give up for a warm embrace. A warm embrace, she wasn’t sure there had ever been a true embrace in her life from this man.

  If respect is what she had, then she would use it to beat this man into submission for daring to love the goal of siring the perfect vessel, more than his daughter.

  Her.

  You are doing well, this is good. Yin told her.

  Yes, your ability to control your change is much more advanced than our projections and calculations, Yang admitted.

  Why is it that you are so beholding to your math? She asked the two aliens inside her.

  Because there is truth in numbers, Yin replied. A truth that is without peer in the Universe.

  The answers to life, if one can understand the aspects of the question, can be found in numbers. Yang suggested. It is the way of our future. The numbers foretell of a time when there can only be one. One future, one path, one direction for the Kurtherians. We have embraced the effort to be at the top of the future, rather than in the dust of the past.

  Stephanie Lee noted her glowing yellow eyes in the mirror, her lithe body and short fur covering as she drew her right hand down her left arm. Her senses expanded, and she could smell tree’s blooming on the other side of the valley. She walked, to the window and looked out. Here, in this temple, she was now the Leopard Empress. The embodiment of the belief of this clan for almost a thousand years.